Yesterday I got together with one of the gracious people who make Party Time possible, and picked up a manila file folder stuffed with an inch-thick stack of fundraiser fliers. We’ll soon have them input and uploaded into the database, but here’s one I thought worth pulling out — click to see the flier.

The event has already happened, but Sen. Norm Coleman, who narrowly won the first count for his Minnesota Senate seat against Democratic challenger Al Franken, held a fund raiser on Nov. 18 to raise money for the recount battle. That shouldn’t be a shocker. Ten days earlier, his campaign sent around this flier to supporters, including D.C. PACs, looking for volunteers.

The last dramas of Election 2008 have yet to play out — money continues to be raised, and 527s are running political ads in Georgia’s runoff election. But already, the focus on Washington is on the future — on incoming members, on the new administration, and, of course, on the 2010 election.

Welcome to Election Day. Tonight congressional candidates will gather with their supporters in hotel ballrooms and community halls across the country to watch the returns come in. Winning means being able to party on in the future. For those that lose, they’ll still party. Many will likely go through the revolving door to become lobbyists where their jobs will include setting up fundraising parties for others.

Here at Party Time over the last few weeks, we’ve written on the fundraising parties thrown for candidates in some of the hottest races–who presumably have some the hottest parties. You can read about Sen. Ted Stevens (R-AK) here; Sen. Elizabeth Dole (R-NC) here; the Minnesota Senate race here; Rep. Marilyn Musgrave (R-CO here; and the Colorado Senate race here.

And below is a list with links to the parties thrown for candidates in the most competitive House and Senate races, as identified by the National Journal. (As always, we must caution that our Party Time database contains the invitations we receive from anonymous lobbyist sources. It is highly unlikely that we receive all the invitations to all the parties that have been thrown. We’re always happy to receive more invitations.)

Senate

1. VA: Jim Gilmore (R) v. Mark Warner (D)

2. NM: Steve Pearce (R) v. Tom Udall (D)

3. CO: Bob Schaffer (D) v. Mark Udall (D)

4. NH: John Sununu (R) v. Jeanne Shaheen (D)

5. AK: Ted Stevens (R) v. Mark Begich (R)

6. NC: Elizabeth Dole (R) v. Kay Hagan (D)

7. OR: Gordon Smith (R) v. Jeff Merkley (D)

8. MN: Norm Coleman (R) v. Al Franken (DFL)

9. GA: Saxby Chambliss (R) v. Jim Martin (D)

10. LA: Mary Landrieu (D) v. John Kennedy (R)

House

1. NY-13: Bob Straniere (R) v. Michael McMahon (D)

2. NY-25: Dale Sweetland (R) v. Dan Maffei (D)

3. AZ-01: Sydney Hay (R) v. Ann Kirkpatrick (D)

4. VA-11: Keith Fimian (R) v. Gerry Connolly (D)

5. FL-16: Tim Mahoney (D) v. Tom Rooney (R)

6. IL-11: Martin Ozinga (R) v. Debbie Halvorson (D)

7. OH-16: Kirk Schuring (R) v. John Boccieri (D)

8. TX-22: Nick Lampson (D) v. Pete Olson (R)

9. AK-AL: Don Young (R) v. Ethan Berkowitz (D)

10. FL-24: Tom Feeney (R) v. Suzanne Kosmas (D)

Senate veteran Mitch McConnell (R-KY) wasn’t supposed to be in a tight race. He’s an old pro who has raised far more money than his opponent, Democrat Bruce Lunsford. But now polls are tightening a bit, and even the conservative National Review says he “is in a much closer race than Republicans would like to admit.” (”Pushing 60,” National Review, Nov. 3, 2008, subscription required.)

As befitting a fundraising pro–McConnell served as the chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Campaign Committee in the late 1990s–our Party Time database shows that the senator spends a lot of his time partying for others. We’ve got 21 invitations on file where he has been mentioned as a draw to get donors to attend an event for GOP senators and candidates. Last month alone, he got a half dozen mentions on fundraising invitations. These included parties for Sen. Gordon Smith (R-OR), Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME) , Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) , Sen. John Sununu (R-NH), would-be senator Bob Schaffer from Colorado and Rep. Steve Pearce, who is running for Senate in Arizona. (It should be noted that a number of other senators are also mentioned on these invitations.)

McConnell was also mentioned on an unusual invitation–a September party honoring not lawmakers themselves, but rather their chiefs of staff.  While the staffers may have gotten the kudos, however, the checks went to their bosses via a special joint fundraising committee, the “Special Teams 2008 Committee, established by the National Republican Senatorial Committee and a long list of state GOP committees-Alaska, Louisiana, Maine, Minnesota, New Hampshire, New Mexico, and Oregon.

We also have two parties on file that benefit McConnell’s own campaign committee. One party, scheduled in April, was hosted by the U.S. Chamber PAC.  The other was a March party at the lobbying firm Patton Boggs hosted by partners  Ben Ginsberg, Ed Newberry , Darryl Nirenberg, and Kevin O’Neill.

What about McConnell’s opponent, Bruce Lunsford? We have only one invitation for him on file, a July party at the home of Heather and Tony Podesta, the powerful Democratic lobbyist couple. (See this blog post from the Wall Street Journal’s Brody Mullins on Heather’s novel protest of Sen. Barack Obama’s reign-in-the-lobbyists stance. )

As always, we must caution that this doesn’t mean that Lunsford didn’t have more fundraising parties; he must have. And McConnell certainly had more, too. Here at Party Time, we tell you what we know based on what our anonymous sources have sent us. We’d love more submissions, because the more we know-the more you know.

Sen. Elizabeth Dole (R-NC) is finding herself in the “fight for her life,”  in defending her seat against Democratic challenger Kay Hagan says the U.S. News & World Report. Her problem, reports the American Spectator, is that she’s spent most of her time in D.C. rather than North Carolina, and that she’s done a poor job of constitutent services.

Dole, however, has done a decent job of partying. Our Party Time database shows nine fundraising parties for the senator this year, all but two of them in Washington, DC.  (We previously blogged here about an August party for Dole sponsored by several timber PACs.) And of those two non-DC events, one was in Georgia and the other in New York City.

The deep connections that Dole enjoys thanks to her extensive GOP pedigree–she served in two cabinet posts and of course is married to former Senator Bob Dole (R-KS)–is evident when you dig into the meat of the invitations.

The Georgia party was hosted by several Republican Georgia elected officials: Governor Sonny Perdue, Secretary of State Karen Handel, and Senators Saxby Chambliss and Johnny Isakson. The venue: the home of Oscar and Virginia Persons. Oscar Persons is a partner at Alston & Bird, a legal and lobbying firm which also happens to employ Sen. Dole’s husband, former Sen. Bob Dole (R-KS), as well as former Sen. Tom Daschle (D-SD).

The New York party in April also featured a former senator as a draw, in this case former Sen. Alfonse D’Amato. (The former Republican senator from New York now lobbies for Park Strategies.) Bob Giuffra and his wife, Joyce, also hosted. Bob is a partner at Sullivan & Cromwell, the venue for the event, where he specializes in securities and white collar crime. Another host, George T. Conway III, is most well known for his reported involvement in the Paula Jones case back in the late 1990s. His firm, Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz, is famous for representing the tobacco giant Philip Morris when the company was sued, along with other tobacco companies, by the U.S. government for deciving the American public about the health effects of tobacco. (Tobacco, of course, is a big industry in North Carolina.)

We don’t have any invitations in our database for Hagan, Dole’s challenger. This doesn’t mean that she doesn’t party too. It only means that we haven’t received any of the invitations. That’s why we always encourage our readers to send us any invitations for congressional fundraisers that come their way.

The Senate race in Minnesota between Republican incumbent Norm Coleman and challenger Al Franken is hot, hot, hot. According to the Mineapolis Star Tribune, the candidate’s third quarter campaign finance reports, filed yesterday with the U.S. Federal Election Commission, showed that former comedian Franken outraised Coleman. However, Franken has less cash on hand as the two candidates battle in the final weeks of the campaign.

Our Party Time database also shows Coleman to be the bigger partier, with nine fundraising parties 2008 scheduled parties. (We must always caution that our collection of invitations is not complete, but rather reflects what we receive through our anonymous lobbyist sources.)

Coleman’s most recently scheduled party was on September 3, a rooftop reception in Minneapolis hosted by the Associated Builders and Contractors PAC. The Virginia-based organization is a longtime fan of Coleman’s and has maxed out to his campaign this election cycle, giving him $10,000, according to the Center for Responsive Politics. A top priority for the group is opposition to the Employee Free Choice Act, which would make it easier for employees to form a union. Coleman is a reliable opponent to the legislation, writing, for example, this opinion piece opposing the bill.

Our Party Time database,  yields no fundraising parties for Franken. That does not mean he hasn’t had fundraising parties–he most certainly has–only that nobody, alas, has sent us the invitations, making us feel somewhat, well, unpopular. For example, the St. Pioneer Press’ Jason Hoppin reported on this fundraising event for Franken on October 4 featuring former Vice President Al Gore, which drew about 1,500 people. Al Franken’s website features photographs from the event.

We do have on file two events from 2006 where Franken served as the entertainment. At this party for Rep. Barney Frank (D-MA), Franken provided “a special introduction.” At this one, for Rep. Robert Scott (D-VA), he was a “special guest.”

As long as we’re on the subject of Colorado, the race in the fourth district has grown tight between three-term Republican incumbent Rep. Marilyn Musgrave and Democratic challenger Betsy Markey. In a sign of how close, today the Colorado Independent reports that the National Republican Congressional Committee is reserving $1.2 million in airtime between now and Election Day for this race. Meanwhile, the Democratic Congressional Committee has reserved $667,000 in airtime.

Our Party Time database shows Musgrave as the beneficiary of half a dozen fundraising parties in 2008. The most recent was a breakfast at the Capitol Hill Club scheduled for September 24, three weeks ago.  The requested contribution was $2,000 to be a “host,” $1,000 for an ordinary attendee. Back in July she was one of seven beneficiaries at a scheduled luncheon sponsored by SCOTTPAC billed as a “Retention Effort for all Conservatives in the House.”

Turning to Markey, who reportedly is suffering from a cash crunch according to this fundraising appeal from House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA),  our Party Time database shows only one party. Scheduled for September 25 at the popular fundraising locale Bistro Bis, the breakfast’s host was Rep. Peter Welch, a Democrat from Vermont.

It’s important to remember that there are likely many more fundraising invitations out there for both Musgrave and Markey that we haven’t received here at Party Time. We only know about the parties our sources tell us about. That’s why we ask our readers to send us more.

Here at Party Time we’re going to start a series of blog posts on fundraising parties thrown for candidates in competitive races this fall. This first post centers on a race close to me–literally–the Colorado Senate race between Republican Bob Schaffer and  current Congressman Mark Udall, a Democrat. (I conduct my Party Time hostessing from my home office in Denver, Colorado.)

Colorado is a swing state this election and the open Colorado Senate seat has drawn a lot of attention and money.  Our Party Time database shows three parties for Schaffer and five for Udall, although not all are in 2008. Given the massive fundraising in this race, surely these two must be partying more than this. Come on, all you people out in Party Time reader land–if you have more invitations, please send them to us!

Udall’s most recent scheduled party in our database was at the South Riding Golf Club in northern Virginia on September 18. Hosts included Brent Blackwelder, a lobbyist for Friends of the Earth; Terry Bracy, who works for the lobbying firm Bracy, Tucker & Brown; Eric Eberhard, who lobbies for Dorsey & Whitney, and Tony Valanzano, who appears to have his own firm as well as working for Bracy, Tucker & Brown, according to lobbying records analyzed by the Center for Responsive Politics. Udall must like this particular golf course. In 2006, several of the same hosts headed up an event there for the Congressman.

Schaffer’s most recent scheduled bash was on the same day as Udall’s–September 18. Held at the popular partying location, the restaurant Johnny’s Half Shell, the most notable thing about this event was the star studded list of lawmaker hosts. These include Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-KY), who is facing his own reelection, Sen. John Kyl (R-AZ), Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-TN), Sen. Bailey Hutchison (R-TX), Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX), and Sen. John Ensign (R-NV). Also on the list, retiring Sen. Wayne Allard (R-CO).

This shows, if we didn’t know it already, that this is a key race for Senate Republicans. So does this event in July at the Charlie Palmer steak house for a joint fundraising committee that is raising cash for several 2008 Senate candidates, including Schaffer.